Washed Your Hands Clean
by running with scissors
Summary: A songfic to "Hands Clean" with Hermione/Snape. Please review!


**Author's Note: I don't own the rights to any of the Harry Potter characters mentioned here; Snape, Hermoine, and others belong to J.K. Rowling. I also do not own the song "Hands Clean", which belongs to Alanis Morisette. **

Hermione Granger smiled to herself if as she laid the cumbersome stack of books down on the desk.The bushy-haired young woman was at Hogwarts, but she was no longer a student. Well, she supposed in a sense she was; she was a student teacher, an intern for the Defense Against Dark Arts teacher. *This school has gone through so many Dark Arts teachers,* she thought with some amusement, *I wonder who they've got now?*  
A tall, pale man appeared in the doorway. "Hello, Miss Granger," he hissed in a coldly familiar voice.   
"Professor Snape!" she greeted him, smiling but not sounding particularly polite, "You always did want this job. Who've they got teaching potions now?"   
He eyed her coolly. "Why do you care?" he demanded.   
She sighed. "You're as pleasant as ever," she murmured sarcastically.   
"As are you," he retorted. 

  
_If it weren't for your maturity,  
none of this would have happened.  
If you weren't so wise beyond your years  
I would have been able to control myself.  
If it weren't for my attention  
you wouldn't have been successful and  
if it weren't for me  
you would never have amounted to very much. _

  
_*_It could be worse,* Snape tried to convince himself, *I could have had a worse assignment*_._ An assignment wasn't quite how he through of Hermoine, but he found no other way to describe how he _did_ think of her. He'd already forced himself to acknowledge that she had the potential to be a great teacher as he watched her work with his students. It was part of what he was required to do - occasionally step back at allow her to teach. And she taught well, really, though it was his personal opinion she was too "soft", let them get away with too much. She was so intelligent, so mature of her age...she always had been, hadn't she? Why hadn't he seen it before? _*_Because that girl was always acting like such a know-it-all,* he reflected bitterly, _*_Anyone can repeat something they've read or heard! Knowledge does not always equal intelligence*_._ Still...she had definite potential. And, he realized, she would get even better if he helped her...  
Hermione watched as the last students filed out of the classroom, heading to their dormitories for the night. "How did I do?" she asked seriously, turning to Snape, looking him up and down, trying to acquire some insight as to how he thought she'd been doing. Suddenly she saw him in a whole new light: he didn't seem to look so mean now, but rather...attractive. Not handsome with his pale skin and greasy hair and sneering face, but definitely somehow attractive.   
Snape slowly drew closer. Horrible, he wanted to sneer, but by the time the word reached his mouth, it became, "Not bad, Miss Granger, not bad at all."  
She smiled. "Really?" she pressed, "Because you can be honest..." They were standing nose-to-nose now, and his hand was hovering three inches away from her shoulder. 

  
_ooh this could be messy   
but you don't seem to mind,  
ooh don't go telling everybody   
and overlook this supposed crime. _

  
Sucking in his breath, he replied earnestly, "I mean it, I think you're doing fine." She noticed this was both a confession grudgingly forced out as well as a genuine compliment. His hand found its place on her shoulder. Hermione moved slightly but made no real protest or effort to brush it aside. In fact, she did just the opposite: she moved her own arms up around his neck and allowed him to kiss her.  
  
_We'll fast forward to a few years later  
and no one knows except the both of us  
and I have honored your request for silence  
and you've washed your hands clean of this. _

The skills as an educator Hermione has possessed already were increasing notably...and picking up at an even faster pace was the budding romance between herself and, oh all possible lovers, Severus Snape. They both knew that their behavior, even if limited to a private affair, was forbidden and risky. *In a few years,* Hermione knew with a certain sadness as she sat grading the paper of his students, *I won't even know him anymore...chances are my next teaching job won't be at Hogwarts. Well, I suppose it is for the best.* 

_  
You're essentially an employee  
and I like you having to depend on me  
you're a kind of protègè  
and one day you'll say you learned all you know from me.  
I know you depend on me  
like a young thing would to a guardian.  
I know you sexualize me   
like a young thing would and I think I like it. _

  
Severus's thoughts had drifted to Hermione once again. He pictured her telling some of her students who had taught her what she was teaching them...  
Snape had, from the moment he first found out about it, known he would enjoy having Hermoine as his intern. He'd relished the idea of her dependence on him and still did, but now for a different reason. He thoroughly enjoyed her newfound sexual and romantic interest in him...and his in her.  
  
_ooh this could get messy  
but you don't seem to mind   
ooh don't go telling everybody  
and overlook this supposed crime.  
  
_It was Christmas now. Hermione was dressed in bright crimson robes that seemed to give her a festive glow as she ambled up and down the corridors, talking to the few students who had chosen to stay behind for Christmas break. _*_I remember when Harry and Ron used to stay behind for Christmas,* she recalled, _*_I wonder where they are right now?*She heard from them frequently, of course, and she had been a bridesmaid at Harry and Ginny's  
wedding, but sometimes it felt as though she was slowly losing contact with her best friends.   
"Penny for your thoughts," the familiar voice made her jump. It was Snape, and although his voice lacked any warmth, affection was conveyed by his facial expression and Hermoine couldn't help but smile.   
"Nothing," she sighed, "nothing at all." She wondered what Harry, or Ron for that matter, would think if he knew of her involvement with their former Potions Master. 

  
_We'll fast forward to a few years later  
and no one knows except the both of us  
and I have honored your request for silence  
and you've washed your hands clean of this.  
What part of our history's reinvented, and under rug swept?  
What part of your memory is selective and tends to forget?  
What's with this distance, it seems so obvious? _

  
Hermione was sleeping, her head nestled against Snape's shoulder. Gently he kissed her eyes, with a tenderness he was never able to show while she was awake. They were lying together in his bed after having made love. Snape knew that, in another year or so, she would be able to leave and seek a real teaching job. He smiled to himself. She'd be good at it...he still thought she was too "soft", but maybe, just maybe, that excessive kindness could be an asset in Granger's career as an educator. Well, he was going to miss her when she went away...even though she wasn't leaving immediately, it felt to him like she was. Of course, he knew that any relationship between them simply could not last, and the sooner she left, the better. 

_Just make sure you don't tell on me  
especially to members of your family.  
We best keep this to ourselves   
and not tell any members of our inner posse.   
I wish I could tell the world  
cuz you're such a pretty thing when you're done up properly.  
I might want to marry you one day,  
if you'd watch that weight and keep your firm body. _

  
Months had passed. With every day, Hermione had been feeling more and more like telling her family that she might be falling in love, but she knew better. There had been times when she'd felt the desire to tell Harry and Ron...but she didn't dare see their reaction, and she knew that at this point her life, her relationship with the man who was still technically her teacher was forbidden.   
Snape, too, knew, and had known, that they did not belong together. Not yet, at least. _*_Maybe in a few years,* he attempted to console himself, but he knew it was impossible. He could hold her now, but he wouldn't be holding her forever.   
As the students filed out of the classroom, an eerie sense of dèja vu washed over Hermione. It was just like that day so long ago...she allowed him to kiss her. Whatever would be, would be. 

_ooh this could be messy and  
ooh I don't seem to mind  
ooh don't go telling everybody  
and overlook this supposed crime._


End file.
